2011 Badam Adventure!(ops again)

There are certain things in life, which inspires a person to take(taste?@#) adventure time and again..same is my relation to the king of nuts, Badam.. yes u heard it right..its back again.
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I felt quite bored that day..I was browsing some website...and lol !!..my eyes struck on : Badam Cake..Its been a year since I moved here..but that day.. my eyes pondered on the Electric Oven..it had been a storage area for my cookware..

I checked if I got all ingredients..I seemed to have most of them..I thought..I should give a try and not bother about the outcome..(anyways..I am not the first person to taste it!!?) I browsed the site and managed to make the batter for this eggless Badam Cake.

Now it is experiment time. First time I ever operated oven..I removed all cookware and cleaned the oven..I put the batter on baking tray, preheated the oven. In the mean time, i took a break to watch TV...I left the patio door open, for cool breeze to flow in..Wow.!! what a wonderful eve it was...it was smelling pleasant..the fragrance of spring...

Suddenly I felt some slight burning smell. like that of the oil..I wondered what it could be..and thought I would check the oven once...my goodness!! There was something burning inside the oven..since it was an unused, new oven..I thought there was some plastic sticker or so that started baking inside..I really didn’t know what to do..we have a portable fan..I immediately got it 'ON' and left the oven door open. I could see a blaze of fire inside....thoughts rushed in my head....Ops the fire alarm, followed my Mamu!! oh no!!..Should i call my hubby??..oh no!!..he'll go mad..I saw myself amidst smoke from oven.. I quickly realized the fan was helping the flames and quickly turned the fan off. I took a closer look at oven..and saw there was some paper, lying on the upper coil of the oven...I immediately grabbed a pair of tongs and pulled out the burning fire..I rushed and threw the burning flame at patio..there were ashes of the paper all around the home..

Well. all such things are common in life..I thought..I must not worry or get scared abut this..I grabbed the cake pan..took guidance from my sister in law and let the cake to bake..

In the mean time, I cleaned the mess ,. and made the house clueless of what happened..It was evening time, and my hubby came home..he immediately said.." hey, I feel some burning smell...what happened"..( oh no, he is very sensitive to smell...hmm..) I smiled and said..today is an adventure day for him..he said "Is it badam halwa!!??" I laughed and said.."It’s an upgraded version...Introducing..Badam cake!!". I can never forget his reaction.., in the mean time., I called my parents at NY..They wished my hubby - all the best( "for eating cake")..I opened the oven and gave the first cake piece to him..

My hubby said, it was more like bread..Guess what? I realized I forgot to add sugar to the cake..But we did like it.

I immediately put cream cheese, sprinkled sweetener, little honey and some jam..It was indeed good..

But in the end, I realized the ingredients I used were low fat, no cholesterol stuff.. It was indeed a eggless, low fat cake..Wow.!!

Here goes the recipe..

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Dry Ingredients :

3 cups maida

2 cups ghee roasted powdered badam

Baking soda 1.5 tea spoon

1 pinch salt

2 cardamon + 1 table spoon sugar : powdered

Wet Ingredients

1 table spoon butter(melted)

1 cup sweet concentrated lassi (Brand: Deep)(Fat free)

Badam paste( peeled soaked badam + milk : blend to smooth paste)

1 spoon honey

Mix the wet ingredients into a smooth uniform mixture.

Mix the dry ingredients evenly and slowly add the liquid ingredients.

Preheat the oven at 350F, cook for 30min at 350F.

Icing :

Low calories sweetener.

Fat free cream cheese.

Mix the icing mixture well and spread it on the cake. May spread strawberry jam as well..

Could decorate with berries, cherries etc.

Njoy the Badam adventure..mmm..yummy!!

NTSC Providers and HDMI setting for Dish HD+

We got our 3 year old  42'' SONY Bravia LED Tv from US to India .We had airtel HD connection with us then in India. Airtel guys don't seem to support NTSC format.we used airtel HD box ,with RGB cable and watched our newly arrived TV in black n white for a few days :) . Airtel uses PAL signals.

We found out that NTSC is supported only by Dish TV, Videocon, Tata sky and few others.After some analysis we decided to go with Dish HD. We got the dish antenna installed and the HD box in place.We never got the signal the first day. The next day the dish tech support branch came and tried to finish the setup.Here is what we did to get the signal.

The Dish HD+  set top box is connected to the cable antenna and the hdmi cable from the set top box is to be connected to the HDMI port of the TV.

Two instances when the below setup was useful for us :

1. When you connect your Dish HD+ for the first time, you would get just the audio signal and the TV would say - unsupported signal/format :  You will have trouble to view Dish receiver menu, since its video signal HDMI settings are not compatible for this TV.

2. The last time, I removed the VC card[viewing card] and tried to place it inside the set top box.Please note, the sim card should face down, with the card number and bar code close to us. I turned on the TV , I got just the audio, but not the video.So I had to set the HDMI format again..!

For Airtel HD+, this is the blind fold guide for us!

a. Press 'My A/c' button on the remote.You will reach My Account menu

b. Press the Left arrow 4 times on the remote.
(You will travel past the menu-s : MOD, ActiveServices, Guide and finally reach 'Help' Menu, where you would reach 'Picture Settings' -> )
Press OK on the remote.

[Note: Past the 'Help' menu, you have My DishTV and Recorder menu and again reach My Account.]

c. Now we reach PICTURE SETTINGS menu.
Under the 'PICTURE SETTINGS' menu, the 'HDMI Settings' option would be selected, (note : The Picture setting would initially have 'Default' option.) Now press 'left arrow' on the remote 5 times.That is the setting for 1920 x 1080i@60 HZ

d. Press 'down arrow' on the remote twice. You would have reached 'SAVE' option.Press 'OK' on the remote ..

-->> But the catch here is that, sometimes, the dish box , does a cache of the last menu you accessed! so with 4th left arrow you might not reach Picture Settings menu! it could have reached other menu..so try rebooting the box!

2010 Badam Halwa Adventure!

Last birthday, I wanted to surprise my husband with some dessert..and my eyes caught hold of a big box of Badam(Almonds).. I rushed to Internet, browsed few sites, saw some videos, and prepared Badam Halwa for the first time in my life!!

With limited resources, i managed to complete it..I didn't tell the name of the dessert I made.I asked my husband to close his eyes, and asked him to guess the name of the sweet he was tasting..ops..he said it was milk sweet.

Hey, that was not what I wanted to hear! anyways, he agreed it tasted like a dessert!

During last diwali my passion to cook badam halwa grew stronger..i wanted to prepare the dish for my in-law's house and my parents..i really wanted to prove my capacities...

i got almost 1 kg of almonds..all excited i prepared the badam paste..this time , I was confident..since I already prepared the dish earlier..but it was after I prepared the dish , I realized, that I was over-confident...I put ghee..and sugar to prepare the sugar syrup..oh no..!! it turned into caramel..hey, but that's not at all how halwa needs to be prepared!!..then i added the badam paste and I screwed it very well!!..i left the new unknown dish incomplete..and returned to in-laws...

2 days later, the badam returned to my in-law's home..in a different color, different shape..my mother added gram flour and gave a new life to the incomplete dish I left at mom's home.

Since then, my hubby was making fun of my Badam capabilities..he said..if he wanted to scare his boss or put some one in place..in his office..he told he'd give them the Badam I made.. He said, if I prepared Badam dish..he'll come home late..mm...he made much fun of me....for quite a while..

I got saffron in a nearby shop..

I was stacking the badam ingredients in my kitchen.

Yesterday...I felt quite bored...my eye stuck the badam box, kept on top of our fridge..

I couldn't stop myself from experimenting it...I took quite a less quantity of badam..In half hour, I prepared the dish...I tasted it ..wow..it melted like sugar..wow..the saffron did the magic..color, consistency everything was perfect..

My hubby came from office..i told him, I prepared a surprise sweet for him...He guessed it right ..my hubby was like " Oh noo..!! not again..!".

I made him open his mouth and put the sweet into his mouth..He smiled..He loved it..We had 1 cup of badam halwa..each.. couldn't stop eating it...

It was a success story..Today Badam met its happy ending..(into our mouth :) )

Moral of the story..: keep trying, stop not until u achieve success!!

Though I have troubled and tortured my dear and near ones..with my Badam delight..today it was a Hit ..Here goes my recipe :

Badam Halwa Recipe:

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• 1.5 cups Badam - microwave them for about 2 min and leave them soaked.Peel the skin and leave it soaked for about 2-3 hours. Grind the badam with milk into a coarse paste.

• 2 cups Milk + 2 cups Sugar - boil the milk till it reduces to 50%.

• Now add the magic ingredients into the milk : cardamom + saffron about 12-15 strands.Boil the milk with these, with constant stirring..after about 5-10min..the flavor of these 2 would blend well into the milk.

• Now add the badam paste into the condensed milk.Let it reduce to 50%..keep stirring constantly..add 1 cup of ghee and keep stirring..and let it reduce to 50%..let the paste come to a nice halwa texture..similar to upma.

• allow it to cool..take your cup and enjoy the most delicious mouth watering badam halwa.

Lake Tahoe...in Winter

We were planning for an outing during Christmas vacation this year. We finally ended with a trip to Lake Tahoe.. wow! what a wonderful place it was....I have always heard about snow, seen it in TV.. it was the first time I saw snow in my life!

Lake Tahoe is the second deepest lake in US..It was formed 2 million years ago!! We were about to see this oldest Lake in the world..wow!

The Lake is spread across 2 states in US : Nevada and California.The tourist attractions in Tahoe area available in 2 regions, North and South Lake Tahoe.These regions are known for the enchanting Valleys around them.

In Summer, water rides are popular and in winter, its all snow time!

Our trip was for 3 days..We started on the Christmas eve..we planned to start by 8'clk

in the morning, and as usual, we got late, and started at 12'clk , Friday afternoon..I could see a gradual change in the scenic view, as we traveled.I saw beautiful meadows, Farms and slowly it started getting cold.We could see tall trees welcoming us to Tahoe..wow...truly breath taking!

As we were nearing Tahoe, we saw a Bridal Veil falls of Lake Tahoe. It was a tiny, cute water falls, flowing from a small creek.

It really excited me at lot, and soon, I could see snow all way. We saw a giant snowman, built by the visitors of Tahoe. I really loved it!

We reached South Lake Tahoe around 4pm. It was already dark and we couldn't visit any place at Tahoe that day.We stayed at Richarson Resort at the South Lake Tahoe.We found an Indian restaurant nearby, and it was very crowded..we had our dinner after 1 hour of waiting time.All hotels were buzzing with people, since it was a 'hot' tourist spot during 'Cold' Christmas.

On Saturday, we headed to the Hope Valley, in South Lake Tahoe for Snowmobiling. It was very cold that day, and my husband drove the heavy and sturdy vehicle.It was an exciting ride, we went off track twice. We reached about 7200ft high and rested in the place, where Die Hard 2 was filmed.

That evening, we went to enjoy the breath taking view of the South Lake Tahoe. The shore was all covered with snow, and the steps that was leading to the shore was all snow..we had to literally slide all our way through the snow.

It was Sunday morning, we woke up at 6 am. It had been snowing all night, and our car was under a pile of snow!! We cleaned the car and vacated the guest house. We quickly headed to Gondola ride at Heavenly Hills. It was a must see ride at the Lake Tahoe. We got the most amazing view of the entire lake from the ride..

We halted at about approx. 9000 ft high valley, had a hot star bucks coffee and enjoyed the beauty of the valley, snow fall and the panoramic view of the lake..It was freezing -4 degree Celsius...It was really a heavenly view! We proceeded to the top of the Heavenly hills, at about 1000ft we had to return due bad weather conditions.

We started towards North Lake Tahoe.. we saw many scenic places on our way..we saw the Emerald Bay and proceeded to Squaw Valley

We went for SnowTubing for one hour..the rate was nominal of 20$ per head.We could take 6 rides and enjoyed the 'Snow Tubing' from a height less than 150 ft.

We took breakfast items with us, and this turned very helpful..we could reach the places we wanted to visit in time since we didn't have waiting time in the crowded eat outs.Lake Tahoe has a lot of fun places..we could visit 2 adventures per day..so it is better to plan the fun activities before the trip..

HDMI : Laptop to TV

We got a new Sony Bravia LCD tv last week. We were curious to use HDMI feature available with the new TV. It worked well with a blu Ray DVD player. When we used laptop to TV, we got the picture but the sound failed.

Here is what we did, to play video from laptop to TV via HDMI cable.

Step 1. Insert the HDMI cable at the Laptop end and the TV end.
Step 2. The LCD TV provides about 3 HDMI ports for connecting various devices like : DVD Player, setTop boxes, camcorders, video game Consoles ( PlayStations etc)play. Now, via the TV remote, enable the correct HDMI port from which the laptop is connected to the TV, so that the picture signal from laptop is made available to the TV.
Step 3. Go to the control panel and ensure that the sound signals are tranmitted via the HDMI port and not the headphones port..

If the headphone port is enabled, the HDMI cables will not carry the sound signals.We went wrong here. Go to the control panel in the laptop and make the following changes to the 'Sound' settings of laptop : 'disable' the Speaker/headphone port and 'enable' the HDMI port only, and play the video..

Now you can n'joy HDMI video from Laptop to TV!!